When Women Were Birds: Fifty-Four Variations on Voice

Williams, Terry Tempest

ISBN 10: 0374288976 / ISBN 13: 9780374288976

Published by Sarah Crichton Books, New York, 2012

About this Item

Very Good in Very Good dust jacket; Stated first edition with full number line on copyright page. Signed by the author on the title page, dated May 2012. Light gray paper boards with white lettering on cover and spine. Minor rubbing and wear to edges; small chip missing from tail of spine; a few tiny punctures to paper on bottom edges; mild soiling to edges of text block. White dust jacket with black lettering on cover and spine. Jacket is wrapped in mylar and is not price clipped. Small hole near tail of spine; minor creasing to edges; mild soiling. Tight binding and clean interior. Feather design on endpapers. When the mother of acclaimed author, educator, and conservationist Terry Tempest Williams passed away, she left Williams a collection of blank journals. This book is a lyrical meditation on the mystery of those journals that examines the question, "What does it mean to have a voice? " (from jacket). ; 8vo; 208 pp; Signed by Author.

Seller Inventory # 025448

Bibliographic Details

• Title: When Women Were Birds: Fifty-Four Variations on Voice
• Publisher: Sarah Crichton Books, New York
• Publication Date: 2012
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0374288976
• ISBN 13: 9780374288976
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition: First Edition; First Printing.
• Condition: Very Good
• Dust Jacket Condition: Very Good
• Signed: Signed by Author(s)

About this title

Synopsis

The beloved author of Refuge returns with a work that explodes and startles, illuminates and celebrates

Terry Tempest Williams’s mother told her: “I am leaving you all my journals, but you must promise me you won’t look at them until after I’m gone.”

Readers of Williams’s iconic and unconventional memoir, Refuge, well remember that mother. She was one of a large Mormon clan in northern Utah who developed cancer as a result of the nuclear testing in nearby Nevada. It was a shock to Williams to discover that her mother had kept journals. But not as much of a shock as what she found when the time came to read them.  

“They were exactly where she said they would be: three shelves of beautiful cloth-bound books . . . I opened the first journal. It was empty. I opened the second journal. It was empty. I opened the third. It too was empty . . . Shelf after shelf after shelf, all of my mother’s journals were blank.” What did Williams’s mother mean by that? In fifty-four chapters that unfold like a series of yoga poses, each with its own logic and beauty, Williams creates a lyrical and caring meditation of the mystery of her mother's journals. When Women Were Birds is a kaleidoscope that keeps turning around the question “What does it mean to have a voice?”

 

Note: blank pages are intentional.

About the Author

Terry Tempest Williams is the award-winning author of fourteen books, including Leap, An Unspoken Hunger, Refuge, and, most recently, Finding Beauty in a Broken World. She divides her time between Castle Valley, Utah, and Moose, Wyoming.